"It's Not a Lot, It's All You Got..."

Today, August 26, 2025, was a milestone for me: the 22,000nd day of my existence.

I accidentally realized this two weeks ago, when I did an online search on the date/year of my birth and was led to a website that told me exactly how many days I’ve been alive. I discovered that the big 2-2-0-0-0 was bearing down on me.

There is no inherent significance to the number 22,000, unless you’re a fan of the Moody Blues’ 1981 album, Long Distance Voyager. If so, then you know that “22,000 days, it’s not a lot/it’s all you got…”

Written by Moody Blues drummer Graeme Edge, “22,000 Days” is a treatise on mortality but also about making the best of every one of those 22,000 days. Edge didn’t consult actuarial tables to come up with an exact life expectancy. Instead, he exercised poetic license, going for a nice round number that rolled off the tongue better than something like “23,678 days.”

According to Long Distance Voyagers: The Story of the Moody Blues Volume 2by Marc Cushman (per the Wikipedia entry on “22,000 Days”), Edge apparently thought that 22,000 days equaled 66.5 years, but his math was off – 22,000 days is two months, three weeks and three days past your 60^th birthday, at least if you were born in 1965. Leap years may cause your personal mileage to vary.  

[Incidentally, Graeme Edge died in 2021 at age 80, which would be somewhere in the vicinity of 29,200 days. He got a nice amount of bonus days!]

Long Distance Voyager was released just before I turned 16 (about 5,480 days). The Moody Blues weren’t exactly a hot band prior to the album’s release, but two hit singles, “The Voice” and “Gemini Dream,” pulled in a younger crowd, including the various geeks and nerds — and I say that with great affection — in my 10^th grade social circle. As I noted in a retrospective story on the album that I wrote for PopMatters in 2021 (link to that story below), my friend Mark and I spent a decent chunk of time in the spring and summer of 1981 sitting in his room — with its fish tank housing a single piranha — listening to records. Long Distance Voyager, which sort of split the difference between my Blondie and Mark’s Vangelis, was often playing.

While I was becoming more immersed in new wave at the time, I liked Long Distance Voyager, though “22,000 Days” was not in my top tier of tracks from the album. Still, the philosophical implications of the song were not lost on me, even at 16. Contemplating being a grizzled 22,000-days old man may have even inspired me to write this poem, which I am only moderately embarrassed by:

I want to be clear about something: I have not been sitting around for 44 years contemplating what my 22,000nd day would be like. In fact, I’ve gone years, maybe even decades, at a time without listening to “22,000 Days,” or even thinking about it. Today could have easily gone by without me being aware that it was my 22,000nd.   

Even though the song notes that 22,000 days is “not a lot/it’s all you got,” I don’t mean for my notation of this milestone to be like an exercise in mortality or melancholia (like my maudlin poem above). In fact, it’s more a celebration. As I thought to myself this morning: “Huzzah! It’s my 22,000nd day! I wonder what will be cool about it?”

[Yes, I “huzzah” myself during internal dialogues.]

What was cool about Day 22,000?

· I listened to a fun music playlist while driving to work (though not the Moody Blues).

· I had a nice “IRL” conversation with my son Jimmy.

· I drove to Panera Bread (again, while listening to that fun playlist) and picked up a relatively healthy salad for lunch…

· …which I ate outside, while talking to co-workers I enjoy spending in-office workdays with.

· I had a typically insightful conversation with Gavin at the end of the workday.

· I enjoyed Taco Tuesday with Donna and Chris after I drove home from work, and then I napped on the couch while we were tuned into Orangutan Jungle School.

· And now, as midnight is closing in on my 22,000nd day, I’m typing this essay while listening to Long Distance Voyager.

I didn’t need to skydive or anything like that. My 22,000nd day was fine just the way it was, and I am grateful for it

I look forward to 22,001. Because, as Graeme Edge notes in his song, “Let me go onto tomorrow/One day at a time/Now I know the only foe is time.” 

As promised, you can read my PopMatters essay on Long Distance Voyager here, where you will learn the name of Mark’s piranha.